Bittersweet Reshaping
by Alluna
Summary: Long since dead Shinigami Kurosaki Karin vanishes during a mission. She reappears, but leaves a trail of fighting behind on her way to the centre of Soul Society. As she's declared a traitor Hitsugaya is set on to find out the truth of her betrayal AU HxK


_Disclaimer_: _If I'd created Bleach, I'd have praised myself forever. I didn't create Bleach, but who said I can't praise myself? Kidding. I don't own anything but the story._

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Bittersweet Reshaping

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_Prelude – Shattered_

"We usually don't have public tombstones and graveyards in Soul Society, not even memorials of living people or heroes whatsoever", Hitsugaya paused all too aware of his husky voice, "because there's never anything left to bury. Keep her in your memory, Kurosaki. That's all the likes of us can do."

Behind his desk he turned away from the orange-haired Shinigami, no substitute any longer but a real and official member of the Gotei 13. Obviously he couldn't derive comfort from his recent appointment being confronted with the reality of another fruitless search for his sister; his expression was proof enough. "You want to give up on her?" Like his appearance was torn by insomnia and worry that had been turning into grief more and more over the past week, Ichigo's voice sounded hollow.

This only reminded Hitsugaya of the ache in his chest. He answered shortly, his gaze sternly resting on the outsides of the window, "We have no choice but to assume the worst." He didn't want to see Ichigo's face twist in pain, deepening the lines between his eyebrows; the rings under his eyes would be the same as the ones under Hitsugaya's own cloudy teal eyes. Even if there weren't as deep furrows visible on the forehead of 11th Division captain, he knew the aberrations well that his mind had absently been taking since the Kurosaki girl vanished.

The sun bent low just above the thin line of the horizon; he wondered if she really was still out there somewhere under those soft sunbeams that striped the buildings of Seireitei in shades of yellow and purple. Probably not. Probably she was dead, even deader than before – he cursed at her having mocked the subject of dying in her afterlife that doomed him to remember the macabre irony now.

Ichigo cleared his throat behind him several times, trying to regain his determined voice in order to put more emphasize on his words. "I don't believe she's gone. You know my sister? She's a tough one. And stubborn. All of us Kurosaki's are as stubborn as granite rock."

They all sounded true to him, but still, the syllables resonated strangely unconnected in his ears and faded quickly. "Who knows?" Hitsugaya said automatically. He himself couldn't quite follow his thoughts, but roughly they trailed to where Karin disappeared on a simple mission along with three other members of her team.

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She had absolutely no orientation on the matter of where she was. The middle of nowhere, the edge of the world or any world she knew; a lost place on the map of Soul Society which her teachers back at the academy had forgotten to show their students; the afterlife after the afterlife, a never ending rotation – she admitted some strange kind of joke on the Hinduism, not that she was religious in any sense.

Even though the stripe of evening sky distended at the far end of her eyesight, the sky was colored in a dominating shade of azure blue bare of the mundane distraction of clouds for that she had been wishing for hours now. Moist streaks of transpiration uncovered her natural lighter skin color. She couldn't find it in her to appreciate the sensation of liquid.  
Her throat felt sore, it was too hot, too empty.

For having prowled around in this desert, mostly unprotected to dusty gusts of wind the skin of her naked face and hands and wrists looked chapped, her uniform rather grey than inky black. She literally baked in the sun. She'd seen a polished skeletal on her way, more than one in fact and just hoped that it hadn't been her fellow companions who had been fried until crisp by the sun in high-speed before charred to ashes. Karin couldn't really assess how likely that idea was – she only knew she was alone as far her eyes were able to see.

No plants provided any hoped for shadow. Anyhow, it was not like the vegetation didn't offer anything. The landscape was so generous that there were spread constellations of rocks of different sizes, some fit to serve as a temporary asylum, some not. But the girl was always driven forward by instinct, further, never staying in the more pleasant cool of the shadows for more than a few minutes to regenerate.

_Never let go._

Forcing her half-lidded eyes open once again she nearly mistrusted her eyes when the air meters away from her began to flicker and bend its colors. The earth's light brown and grey mingled with shades of blue, bunching together to result in a black, extending cut in midair. It revolved until its size swelled to some kind of portal. Pitch-black, she would've believed it to be the gate to hell if she hadn't known better. Her right hand flew to her back, curling her palm around crimson silk which covered the hilt of her Zanpakutou.

She never knew she wouldn't make it to a sword fight.

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_Surprise, but this is the start of a somewhat longer story, anyway longer in my terms - I don't plan it to be more than ten chapters at the utmost. It'll be fun to write this. Rated for language and upcoming scenes involving fights and such, just so you know._

_Please give me feedback, guess what will happen, comment on what you liked and disliked to help me improve my skills. Thank you for reading, I hoped you enjoyed the short beginning enough to tell me._


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